<p>I have heard from a source that Franklin and marshall is extremely difficult academically. Is this true, and is it easy to struggle?</p>
<p>Hahaha where did you hear that?? F&M is exactly like high school. If you dominated high school you will dominate F&M. The course work is very easy and not challenging at all. I was just talking about this with a friend that people who dont go to F&M all think its great academically and what not but the people that go there know otherwise. Its easy and also check out how many graduates go to top phd programs and medical schools. You may be shocked at how low this number is. Needless to say i transferred after my first year.</p>
<p>It all depends on the major. F&M produces the most PhD's from any liberal arts college in the field of geology. So, if geology interests you (most likely not...but it interests me!) F&M may be a choice for you.</p>
<p>Pitt alum. '04
UNC-CH grad student</p>
<p>I am a student here at F&M and DoughMan324 obviously doesn't know what he is talking about. F&M is VERY tough academically, I have NEVER heard anyone say that F&M is easy. I know for sure that F&M has an EXCELLENT acceptance rate (90%) when it comes to medical school, and hence, a lot of the students here are pre-med.</p>
<p>Ok first of all while at F&M I did even less work than I did while in high school yet I still ended up with a 3.9 gpa and top of my class. I found f&m was more like high school than college. I was premed at f&m and it was very easy. In fact after I transferred one of the deans of the school who tried to help me out wished me luck and said that I was in fact too smart for f&m. For the academically motivated student I suggest you go elsewhere.
So this 90% acceptence rate sounds great but you need to look closer at it. How many students does the school consider "premed" at this time. This number will be far less than the number of students who say they're pre med. So the data will be slightly skewed in this respect. Sorry if this is confusing. I can try to clarify if you need it.
Secondly the people who get into medschool mostly all go to jefferson and penn state medical school not that there is anything wrong with that. There is NOT a bad medical school in the US thats not what im saying. Im saying that i have high career goals for myself and I want to do an MD/PhD MSTP program and there are only a limited number of these programs in the US. So i went to the career center to see just how many students have gone into such programs. I would have been the first student graduating from F&M entering an MSTP(medical scientist training program, sponsored by the NIH). There is one student who went to an md/phd at penn state but that is not an accredited MSTP program. For academically motivated students like myself f&m is not the place to go. I look forward to any responses you may have.</p>
<p>Dear Doughman, </p>
<p>Your posts about F&M make you seem very bitter and negative.
I'm glad you improved your situation by transfering to another school.
I guess I don't understand why you feel compelled to continue to dump on F&M.
Why focus on what, to you, was a negative experience.</p>
<p>It would be nice to hear what you like about where you are now.</p>
<p>All the best to you in your future studies.</p>
<p>richs73cas,
I know my continual dumping may seem like too much but I had a horrible experience at f&m. I feel as if i wasted a year of my life that i will never be able to get back. I dont want this to happen to other people. No one should go through what I went through last year. So i'm taking it upon myself to tell people the truth about F&M. That it is not as advertised. I just had a horrible year and I blame F&M for it and no one absolutly no one should go through what I went through. So thats the reasoning behind my postings.</p>
<p>What I like about where I am now after transferring from f&m:
Facilities are unmatched (dorms and classrooms)
Beautiful campus
Plethora of activities to do
The people here are all academically motivated like I am. This is going to sound weird and its not a knock on F&M but i'm with a different caliber of people here and I like that.
Everyone is so friendly
Classes are more of what I expected from college, they are very challenging and forcing me to work to my potential while learning so much in the process.
There is always something going on
This is a bigger school with a lot more financial resources
I am presently on committees with a budget totalling well over 10,000 dollars
There are always free bbqs and free events
Frats and drinking are most definitely not the emphasis of this campus
The university has a top 5 medical school where undergraduate research is encouraged
Professors are extremely knowledgable and also very accessible to students
They hand out free t-shirts at many of the events (i now have 8 and counting)
Many more reasons</p>
<p>Doughman</p>
<p>I'm glad that you found a place that you are happy at and enjoy.</p>
<p>Having the initiative to transfer to a school that better fit your needs shows that you had the maturity and ability to correct the initial mis-match.</p>
<p>(How you did that might be a good thread/post on the CC transfers forum.)</p>
<p>Congratulations, and focus on the positive and your achievements :)</p>
<p>Doughman,</p>
<p>Maybe instead of scaring people about F&M you can instead tell them to make sure they think about everything before twice before they commit to any school. We are each different and need to be different places to be happy and successful. Just let people know that and instead of saying it was like high school just say that some people find it easy...just don't scare people away...</p>
<p>Pitt alum. '04
UNC-CH grad student</p>
<p>Doughman-</p>
<p>Let me echo what Ophiolite states...altho' you might find it a bit painful to try and relive that timeframe, it might be a bit of a cathartic (and be of some REAL value to us) to have you set out those moments or events that turned your way of thinking about F&M.</p>
<p>I went to one of those upstate NY schools where the wooly mammoths didn't leave until May...I am sure there were some turning points in my views toward the school, but they are too far off in my memory banks to be recalled.</p>
<p>Doughman,</p>
<p>I think Doughman must have been one of those guys who doesn't fit in socially and is now taking it out on F&M. There is a fine line between being smart and being weird. He must fit in that weird category. I went to F&M and am now at Hopkins medical school, so there are smart people at F&M.</p>
<p>Aecooter-Given the time that you are respondng to this on a Friday afternoon (ie, late!), you clearly are taking a break from something hard there...Anatomy, per chance?</p>
<p>Hey Doughman- can you help us by setting out WHEN it turned sour for you? First roomate? First mixer? First frat event? First concert? First mid-term grades that surprised you?</p>
<p>To decide in favor of F&M over other schools...well, there HAD to be a fair amount of rationization about "Why I am choosing F&M over X and Y and Z."</p>
<p>Where...specifically...did that positive feeling fall away? And what then proceeded to amplify that negative view?</p>
<p>This would help us all in terms of the <em>right</em> decision, and I look forward to your thoughts...</p>
<p>Thanks, dough...8^)</p>